 President Obama and President-elect Donald Trump meet in the Oval Office of the White House on Nov. 10. (Michael Reynolds/European Pressphoto Agency) Every week, I answer a question from Monday’s Act Four chat in the Wednesday edition of this newsletter. You can read the transcript of the Nov. 28 discussion here and submit questions for the Dec. 5 chat here. This week, a reader asks me to sort out a post-election conundrum. (And yes, I know that this is a newsletter of culture and politics, but lately folks seem to be grappling with the culture of politics in the chat, so I’m doing my best to answer. I’m sure we’ll tilt back toward culture as Oscar season and year-end roundups approach.) What does it say about us that we tend to elect someone of the opposite temperament of what we currently have? I continue to be baffled that Obama can have such a high approval rating, yet we elected Trump to succeed him. If I have learned anything from reading public opinion polling, it’s that what we say we like and what we want, and what we actually do, don’t always map neatly onto each other. So maybe people feel more positive about President Obama now that he’s nearing the end of his term and nostalgia is setting in. Maybe people are feeling buyer’s remorse about having voted for Donald Trump. Perhaps respondents don’t actually like Obama as much as they say they do, and that approval is grudging. It’s possible we’re mixed up in what we feel. But I suspect a more satisfying answer for you is that we’re reactive. Voters who wanted the change Obama promised, but who feel as though they didn’t get it, may be willing to try out his opposite: a white man who speaks bluntly rather than of unity, who makes promises rather than asking Americans to strain toward a new understanding, who tells people what they want to hear — that the factory will come back, that they don’t have to be nice — and whose family life is a patchwork rather than an exemplar. If one thing didn’t work, maybe something else will. For some voters, I guess Obama offered one kind of comfort, while Trump offers another. This, of course, doesn’t take into account obstructive congressional Republicans, or the breakdown of state-level governance, or the fact that we face complex realities on issues ranging from the automation of work to the threat of global warming that the United States can’t easily solve on its own. I don’t know that “Change We Can Believe In” or “Hope” did, either. Voting based on what we wish can be a capricious thing. | 
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